Subsidizing Contractor Misconduct: Calvin's Storyby Chris Thompson, Special to CorpWatchCalvin Bryant was crippled in a Imperial Sugar plant explosion in Savannah, Georgia, that also killed 14 of his co-workers. In a new CorpWatch investigation into federal contractors who win millions in government business despite violating workers rights, Chris Thompson tells his story.

Subsidizing Contractor Misconduct: Rodney's Storyby Chris Thompson, Special to CorpWatchRodney Bridgett was killed when a piece of Tyson Foods’ heavy equipment crushed him at the company's beef processing plant in Sioux City, Iowa. In a new CorpWatch investigation into federal contractors who win millions in government business despite violating workers rights, Chris Thompson tells his story.

U.S.: Is MF Global Getting a Free Pass?by Joe Nocera, New York TimesMarch 12th, 2012During the final, desperate days before it entered bankruptcy proceedings, MF Global executives took money from segregated customer accounts — money that belonged not to MF Global but to the farmers and commodities traders that were its clients — and used it to prop up its rapidly collapsing business. Nor was this petty cash: of the $6.9 billion in customer assets that MF Global held, a stunning $1.6 billion is missing. There is virtually no chance that the full amount will ever be recovered.

U.S.-E.U.: WTO rules Boeing got $5B in illegal US subsidiesby John Heilprin, Associated PressMarch 12th, 2012The World Trade Organization ruled that U.S. planemaker Boeing received $5.3 billion in illegal government subsidies over a quarter-century. Airbus and Boeing have both complained to the WTO that the other is receiving state aid. They are locked in a long-running trade dispute over a market believed to be worth more than $3 trillion over the next decade.

INDIA: Supreme Court to Hear Dispute on Drug Patentsby Vikas Bajaj and Andrew Pollack, New York TimesMarch 6th, 2012A Swiss drug company, Novartis, will go before the Indian Supreme Court this monnth to fight patent laws that protect the global supply of inexpensive medicines to treat AIDS, cancer and other diseases. The lawsuit - which involves a drug called Gleevec - is being opposed by international aid groups.

INDIA: Camera Obscura and the manufacture of happinessby Aman Sethi & Priscilla Jebaraj, The HinduMarch 6th, 2012An advertisement flooding airwaves across India would have you believe that a company called Vedanta is a creating a product called happiness. But London-based Vedanta Resources has attracted the ire of environmental activists and human rights groups like Amnesty International who have accused the company of exploiting indigenous communities — such as the Dongria Kondhs of Niyamgiri in Odisha — without due process.

U.S.: MF Global Criminal Probe Said to Slow After Quick Start
by Patricia Hurtado, Bloomberg NewsMarch 2nd, 2012U.S. investigators of bankrupt MF Global Holdings Ltd. have yet to determine after four months of probing whether enough evidence exists to pursue a criminal case. The company collapsed after a $6.3 billion bet on the bonds of some of Europe's most indebted nations went sour.
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U.S.: Will Wall Street Ever Face Justice?by Phil Angelides, New York TimesMarch 1st, 2012Four years after the disintegration of the financial system, 24 million people jobless or underemployed. Yet claims of financial fraud against companies like Citigroup and Bank of America have been settled for pennies on the dollar, with no admission of wrongdoing. Executives who ran companies that made, packaged and sold trillions of dollars in toxic mortgages and mortgage-backed securities remain largely unscathed.

WORLD: Top Hedge Fund Managers Took Home $13 billion In 2011by Sam Forgione, ReutersMarch 1st, 2012The top 40 highest-earning hedge fund managers took home a combined $13.2 billion, according to a Forbes magazine survey. The top 10 hedge fund managers made more than $200 million each, while the lowest earning managers made $40 million each.

SERBIA: One-Dollar Steel Mill Exposes Cracks In Privatisationby Vesna Peric Zimonjic, Inter Press ServiceFebruary 16th, 2012In 2003, U.S. Steel bought up the bankrupt Sartid steel mill in the eastern Serbian town of Smederevo for $33 million, the first private enterprise to enter the country after the downfall of former leader Slobodan Milosevic in 2000. On Feb. 1, U.S. Steel sold the mill back for a dollar.

SYRIA: US technology used to censor the Internet in Syriaby Pratap Chatterjee, The Bureau of Investigative JournalismOctober 23rd, 2011Technology from a major Silicon Valley company, Blue Coat, is being used by the Syrian government to censor the Internet and monitor dissidents, according to activists. The equipment can be used to monitor users and block access to certain websites, such as social networking applications like Facebook and internet phone sites like Skype, which were key to the Arab Spring uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia

U.S.: TransCanada Pipeline Foes See U.S. Bias in E-Mailsby Elisabeth Rosenthal, New York TimesOctober 3rd, 2011E-mails obtained by Friends of the Earth paint a picture of a collaborative relationship between lobbyists for TransCanada and the U.S. State department, the agency that has final say over a 1,661 mile pipeline that will transport tar sands crude from Alberta to Texas. Embassy officials in Ottawa procured invitations to Fourth of July parties for TransCanada officials and shared information with the company about Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s meetings.